Avoid money issues to your own peril. Time is the best predictor of future returns. In short, start investing sooner to significantly improve your long term wealth building opportunities. I love this example:

From age 25 to 65 LaShaun invested $300 per month in a diversified portfolio of stocks and bonds (In a retirement account) and earned an average of 7 percent annual return. At age 65, his $144,000 contribution grew to $787,444.

LaShaun’s twin sister Devorah waited until age 40 to start investing for retirement. She knew she was behind in her savings and decided to invest $500 per month in her workplace retirement account. Devorah also saved until age 65 in a diversified portfolio of stock and bond funds an earned 7 percent annually. Her $150,000 total investment was only worth $405,036 at age 65

The takeaway: LaShaun invested $6,000 less than Devorah and earned #382,408 more than his twin! Time is your most valuable resource in wealth accumulation. Don’t waste it!

When back to school shopping, spend less on unnecessary new clothes and replacement of perfectly suitable backpacks and more on your family’s future. Your future self will thank you.

Start building wealth this back to school season!

Get inspired with these quality money articles from well respected personal finance bloggers.

When kids go back to school – Boost investing for the future!

Editors Picks:

Michael Kitces from Nerd’s Eye View forces you to confront your assumptions and look at retirement planning with a more critical eye in Renaming The Outcomes Of A Monte Carlo Retirement Projection. Michael recommends, “When doing retirement planning using today’s modern tools (i.e., “Monte Carlo analysis”) there is a tendency to view the results as an all-or-none outcome: success, or failure. Yet the reality is that “success” in Monte Carlo actually means an excess left over, while “failure” simply means a requirement to make adjustments along the way. Perhaps it’s time to reframe how we think about retirement planning?”

How can we ignore a money article tying Led Zepplin to retirement investing? Roger Wohlner from The Chicago Financial Planner presents Led Zeppelin and Your 401(k), and reminds us, “A 401(k) plan can be a daunting and intimidating investment vehicle. Being dazed and confused is great when listening to Led Zeppelin. However this state of mind has no place in plotting your financial future.”

How many of you are lured by FREE? I know I am. We’ve sat through many timeshare presentations for the free gift! Ray from Squirrelers cautions us in, The “Free” Movie Ticket That Was Not So Free, and says, “Free is good, right? Well, it usually is, but sometimes things that are free can actually end up costing us money!”

I’m a sucker for funny hilarious. I’ve never read this website by 2 academics before, but this post had me chuckling! I admit, I’ve ignored a checkbook error under $100 as well :). Nicole from Grumpy Rumblings presents Confession: Sometimes the checkbook doesn’t balance, and says, “Nicole and Maggie confess that sometimes the check-book doesn’t balance, and sometimes they don’t fix it.”

This is a creative idea for compulsive spenders. There’s only one drawback with this innovative strategy… you have to hold yourself accountable. And, if you’re a compulsive spender, you may be unable to implement this plan from Daniel at Sweating the Big Stuff. He presents Force Yourself To Save With A 100% Personal Tax, and says, “With income taxes, you pay the government for money you earn. But with a personal tax, you pay yourself for money you spend.”

Finance

Jeremy Berretta from My Financial Road presents My Savings Problem, and says, “Recently, I read “The Automatic Millionaire” by David Bach and it dawned on me that I although I have been paying myself, I haven’t been paying myself FIRST. I was simply going through the motions of going to work, paying my bills and saving whatever was leftover at the end of the month. This led to me not saving so much since I would spend a little more on groceries or go buy see a movie or something and there wasn’t much left to save.

Harry Campbell from YourPFpro presents What’s the Easiest Job You’ve Ever Had?, and says, “Even from a young age, I’ve been hustling to find the easiest jobs that would pay me the most. When I was a kid, my neighbor and I would steal lemons from another neighbor’s tree and sugar from his parents to set up a lemonade stand on the corner. I’ll be honest, the money wasn’t great, but since my parents didn’t give me an allowance, it was the only way we could make money so we could buy candy at the liquor store.

Daisy from When Life Gives You Lemons, Add Vodka presents Are Your Planning Tendencies Costing You Money?, and says, “Are you a planner? If so, it may be costing you unnecessarily. ”

Money Management Mikey from On Better Terms presents 5 Financial Questions to Ask Before Saying “I Do”, and says, “You’ve found your soul mate and you’ve decided to spend the rest of your life with this person. This is an amazing feeling, and as you prepare for a life together, you undoubtedly discuss major details. If you’re like a lot of couples, you may conveniently skip discussions about money. However, skipping money discussions before saying “I do” can get your marriage off to a bad start. For this matter, don’t make the union official until you’ve asked these five financial questions. ”

Funny about Money presents Planning for Your Survivors: How Much Insurance?, and says, “Evan’s great post at My Journey to Millions spins off some thoughts about figuring how much life insurance you need at different times of life, and why.

Big Cajun Man from The Canadian Finance Blog presents Lifestyle Creep, and says, “If you continue to live up to your salary, it is going to get you in trouble.”

Tie the Money Knot presents What to Do With Wedding Cash Gifts, and says, “When it comes to weddings, it’s generally customary for attendees to give a gift. This article shares tips on what to do with wedding cash.”

Eric from Narrow Bridge Finance presents 6 Reasons Financial Advisors Are Scarier Than Dating Taylor Swift, and says, “The 23 year old singer broke into the spotlight with poppy, catchy songs a few years ago. As she rose to fame for her music, she also gained a reputation for being a serial dater.”

Investing

Investing Jon from Novel Investor presents Guide to the Different Types Of Mutual Funds, and says, “If you understand the different types of mutual funds, you’ll know how a fund invests your money, the risks involved, and how it fits in your portfolio.”

Dividend Growth Investor presents How to define risk in dividend paying stocks?, and says, “For many equity investors these days, risk is usually defined as an unfavorable fluctuation in stock prices. This means that an investor who purchased Coca-Cola (KO) at $40/share, and observes the price decline to $30/share, had a $10 unfavorable move in the price against them. This view on risk could be adequate for investors whose investing timeframe is in days or months.”

Investor Junkie from Investor Junkie presents The Most Important Investment Advice: Invest in Yourself, and says, “If you’ve ever worked in sales, then you know it’s almost impossible to increase your income without first becoming a better salesman. The same is true when it comes to investing your money. In order to get better investment results, you first have to become a better investor. That means at least some of your investment needs to be in yourself.”

Jacob from My Personal Finance Journey presents How Do You Analyze A Penny Stock?, and says, “This post describes how Jacob from My Personal Finance Journey analyzed an individual penny stock and also what his thoughts were on the specific stock, PLC Medical Systems, Inc. (OTCQB symbol: PLCS).”

Michael from Financial Ramblings presents Deciding When to Rebalance Your Investment Portfolio, and says, “Rebalancing your investment portfolio helps you maintain your risk profile. But how do you know when to rebalance? Yes, you want to keep things in check, but there’s no sense in going overboard.”

Frugality

Pauline from Make Money Your Way presents Make Money with your Garden, and says, “Here are a few ways you can make money with your garden, by selling your plants, produce or canned goods.”

David from Financial Nerd presents 4 Great Inexpensive Dates, and says, “Four great ways to spend time meeting someone new and not spending a lot of money.”

Economy

PK from Don’t Quit Your Day Job presents More on the Baby Boomers…, and says, “Opportunity to link Bill McBride’s excellent graph of population? Check. Here lies an exploration of the changing shape of the workforce over time.”

Budgeting

Jason Hull from Hull Financial Planning presents Why Do We REALLY Need to Budget, and says, “There’s one true reason that we budget, and it has to do with the region-β paradox. Read more to find out why.”

FI Pilgrim from Build A Better Budget Part 1 – The Mindset presents Build A Better Budget Part 1 – The Mindset, and says, “It pays dividends to think through the process of creating a budget before you get started. What’s the purpose? What does it consist of?”

CareerLazy Man from Lazy Man and Money presents Negotiating Job Perks, and says, “I am terrible at negotiating, but maybe even I could negotiate this–a swanky job title. Looking through my LinkedIn connections this seems to be extremely pervasive. Or maybe people just take it upon themselves to give themselves a great sounding title there.”

Other

Saving Pauline from Reach Financial Independence presents 10% blog income pledge: sponsor a child, and says, “10% of my blogging income will go to sponsor young girls’ education in my Guatemalan village.”

Emily from Evolving Personal Finance presents Would Someone Date You After Seeing Your Taxes?, and says, “If you could see someone’s tax return before accepting a date with him/her, what would you look at to help determine your answer? What would a potential date look at in your return?”

Evan from My Journey to Millions presents It is Amazing How Local Personal Finance Can Be, and says, “Most people discuss personal finance rules in absolute terms. I hate it! I truly believe there are almost NO SET PERSONAL FINANCE RULES.

Monica on Money has a chance to win money for you! She presents $25 August Giveaway and Goals!, and says, “Now that it is August, it is time to think about my financial goals for the month. Here are my top 3 goals for August.”

Kathleen O’Malley from Frugal Portland presents Wantable: Is it Worthwhile?, and says, “Wantable has very fun premise. You fill out a survey and they send you the items they think you want based on those results.

“Nathan from Ask N Why presents How to Avoid Business Pitfalls, and says, “Usually, amateur business entrepreneurs both online and in the actual world miss this a thousand times.”

Bryan from Gajizmo.com presents Famous Quotes By Famous People, and says, “Whether we are trying to improve our lives personally or professionally, we all sometimes need famous inspirational quotes to help us power through the challenge in life. Whether it is life, death, success, failure or money, famous quotes by famous people can provide insight into how to better our lives. Here is a list of the 150 best famous quotes that will inspire and motivate you to achieve.”

Mama PoP from Planting Our Pennies presents The Gift Of Time, and says, “Mama PoP reflects on time spent volunteering and staying at home as a young mother and wonders in hindsight if that was the best use of her most precious gift, her time. ”

Common readers, share your money plans for the next few months?

image credit; google images_flicker creative commons

10 Comments

Thanks for including Funny’s post on estimating a family’s life insurance needs. And thanks for hosting — its a big job!

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I am a portfolio manager, former university finance instructor, and successful investor committed to sharing my personal finance expertise with you. I am not a licensed financial advisor. Please do not construe the suggestions on this website as recommendations for your personal situation. For any individual financial advice please seek your own licensed and/or registered personal financial adviser or CPA. Per FTC guidelines, this website may be compensated by companies mentioned through advertising, affiliate programs or otherwise.